Monday, 29 July 2013

I had the privilege to spend a long day (13th
July, 2013) at the Gyula
Shakespeare Festival, Hungary. It was an enchanting day due to three
absolutely great programmes I could attend: a mini-conference focusing on
Shakespeare’s monologues in general and the “To be or not to be” soliloquy in
particular; Steven Berkoff’s solo performance about Shakespeare’s villains; and
lastly a Measure for Measure in the
Castle Theatre. All these programmes proved to be special in their kind, giving
inspiration and food for thought since then.

The most interesting aspect of the
mini-conference was what may be called its multidisciplinary approach, as the
participant came from a variety of walks of (intellectual) life. The eight
people who gave a talk at the conference included an actor, Steven Berkoff,
directors, Csaba Kiss, Yuriy Butusov, Emil Boroghina, and from the academia Maria
Shevtsova, Ádám Nádasdy, Gabriella Reuss and myself. I am not claiming that
there was much communication between the disciplines and approaches, but at
least many representatives of the fields of Shakespeare’s reception were
together and could listen to each others’ talks and hopefully learned from each
other—I learned a lot at least.

After the conference and some rest we could
watch Steven Berkoff’s performance, representation and interpretation of
Shakespeare’s most notable villains. The list included Macbeth, Lady Macbeth,
Richard III, Hamlet (yes, Hamlet was also included, for being “a serial
killer”). Although the villains were in the thematic focus of the performance,
yet through and with them we saw the stage and the screen of Shakespearean
performances, great actors with Berkoff’s eyes. Or more precisely the focus was
on MAN, and indeed with capital letters: the mediocre, the fallible, the
fallen, the happy, the frustrated and jealous MAN, who is there everywhere,
over there and in here. It was professional skillfulness, self-indulgence and
self-irony that made this performance memorable and enchanting.

The greatest surprise of the day was Measure for Measure by the Vahtangov
Theatre, Russia. The performance cannot be unknown to the English audience, as
it was staged during the 2012
London Globe World Festival. This very performance at Gyula really made my
day, as this production was one of the very few theatrical performances that
was composed and directed in an innovative and creative way, where from the
large picture to every little movement was worked out and measured with a
coffee spoon. The stage was located within the walls of the Castle, which
created a special atmosphere for the production. The stage was surrounded by
the high solemn brick walls of the Castle. These walls towering above the stage
created the atmosphere of a suffocating area, a prison from where there is no
escape. Or if there was some room for escape that was only upwards, as the
stage was not roofed, which circumstance made Isabella’s prayers all the more
powerful, credible and even moving.

I found the repetitions and doubling fantastic, when complete scenes were repeated during the performance. The most
powerful repetitions were those of the opening and closing scenes where the
same characters and the same litter filled the stage including the Duke’s
immovable eternity, Mistress Overdone’s eroticism, the chaos of the Viennese
people, the painful loneliness of the characters with the exception of Claudio
and Juliet who represented through their dance some unity and harmony. Also the
seduction scenes imitated each other with the long row of tables to separate
Isabella and Angelo for the first time and Isabella and the Duke for the
second. The initial separation was in both cases overcome by the aggression of
chasing and catching and pinning Isabella to a table. Doubling was also really thought-provoking.

Besides the general features of the performance
I was also enchanted by the skill and refinement of the actors, especially
those of Evgeniya Kregzde (Isabella) and Sergey Epishev (Duke/Angelo). Evgeniya
Kregzde’s Isabella was the most innocent, incredibly unhappy Isabella I have
ever seen. In this production the question was not whether she is to be raped
or not, but here the rape was an unavoidable fact, the question was rather who
would rape her, when and where and how many times. Under these painful
circumstances Kregzde could remain innocent with her adolescent eagerness to
find her place in Vienna, looking for and accepting love. Especially her scene
with her brother in the prison was most natural, the playful chasing of each
other, the long brotherly embraces made us believe that they were really a loving
brother and sister. Her small teenage stature was played upon really thoughtfully
when during her first encounter with Angelo she was blown by the provost and
Lucio, and she was running up and down like a feather, a butterfly energized
and influenced by the male characters. Even here, she could avoid being seen as
a lightweight woman, a butterfly of the night, the frail woman, but remained
with her dance-like tiptoeing back and forth a woman who was both reluctant and
eager to plead, who intends to remain herself even under the pressure of the
unwelcoming circumstances. Kregzhde could represent through her refined and
thought-over acting style the mystery of a woman, the irresistible attraction
that does not emanate from hot eroticism but from charismatic innocence.

In her presence both Angelo and the Duke lost
control, which was acted out with utmost precision by Sergey Epishev. What
Epishev’s acting pointed out was that Angelo and the Duke were both dangerous
men, dangerous but in different ways. Angelo seemed to be dangerous because of
his repressed frustration that surfaced in his mania for order in the smallest
details. This display of repression appeared when meeting Isabella, in his uncontrollable
shaking which turned into an iconic long and mute shriek that he kept until he
staggered backwards throughout the whole stage. The danger in his Duke was
rather the danger of the cunning, indifferent man of power for example when dressed
as a monk, he played with heads as if they did not belong to living human
beings, when he did nothing in the midst of chaos, aggression and filth of his
dukedom, when he arranged the tables in the same way as Angelo had done and
chased Isabella and nailed her down like Angelo. Epishev with his superb skills
brought out form his characters what was the most frightening in them with incredible
subtlety.

So if I say I was enchanted that very day in
Gyula, there is not much exaggeration in this. The conference, the two
performances opened worlds to me that I still fight to digest. And for this enchantment
I owe many thanks to the Gyula Shakespeare Festival, the conference speakers,
the actors and directors of the performances and ultimate organizer of the
Festival, József Gedeon. So, I can hardly wait for the enchantment that is to
come next year! Are you going to join me?

Tuesday, 23 April 2013

It was a beautiful and hot afternoon in June,
2012 when the idea of re-establishing the Hungarian Shakespeare Society was
conceived. The narrative about the conception and what has followed from it is
the topic of this blog post, which in turn is my contribution to the
celebration of Shakespeare’s birthday (#hbws) in the blogosphere.

On that beautiful and hot afternoon I was
writing a paper in my office, and as always Twitter messages kept popping up—a
peaceful afternoon indeed. I was just about to fall asleep, a post-lunch
biorhythmic problem so to say, when a Direct Message from Stanley Wells woke me
up. Kindly he asked if we were going to meet in Gyula, Hungary at the annual
Shakespeare Festival where he was an invited guest. As the office happened to
be in the US, at the University of Notre Dame, where I was fortunate enough to
act as a visiting fellow, I had to respond that it was rather unlikely that I
could make it.

Having agreed on this, he—by the way—asked which one of his books I think should be translated into Hungarian, as the organizers of
the Festival could have it translated. I was about to respond with a book title
when it occurred to me that this would be a great opportunity to practice what
I preach, i.e. the power of collaboration. So instead of sending the DM
immediately, I sent a circular out to a dozen Hungarian colleagues to enquire
about their opinion. I thought that a day-or-two delay would cause no problem.
To my greatest surprise after two hours emails started pouring in, and five
hours later my fellow Shakespeareans from all over Hungary voted for a book, so
my task lay in channelling the winner back to Stanley Wells.

Now, four considerations followed from this chain
of events. First, there exists a sense of belonging to each other among Hungarian
Shakespeare scholars. Second, it is worth asking about the opinions of others,
because together we are cleverer and wiser—the title I sent over to Prof. Wells
was not the one I voted for. Three, modern technology can be deployed to
overcome distance: inspiration came via Twitter and the rest could be solved
through email. Four, all of us proved to be enthusiastic about forming general
opinion, or, in other words, shape Shakespeare’s Hungarian cult, as the choice
was made with an eye on what the reading public may need.

These four considerations formed the premises
for a conclusion: this collaboration and belonging together may well be
institutionalized. Not pondering too much, when letting my colleagues know about
the winner of the poll, I also asked a further question about re-establishing
the Hungarian Shakespeare Society. Actually, I was not really surprised at the
fast and enthusiastic responses. The idea, thus, was in the air before asking
it, but somebody had to phrase the timely question.

This way there began the meditation about
organizing the Society, which took some time. We pondered about what the aim of
the Hungarian Shakespeare Society should be, what kind of an institutional
structure would foster this aim. Many emails were sent around, many Google
spreadsheets were filled, analyzed by the time the new Hungarian Shakespeare Society
could elect a president and a steering committee, could decide on what the Society
should do, who should be involved and why. This time of thinking, brainstorming
and discussions proved not only fruitful but joyful as well, scholarly
friendships came into being and old ones got stronger, so this phase was really
beneficial. As a result, eight months later, on 26 January, 2013 during
the biannual conference of the Hungarian Society for the Study of English we
could announce the (re)establishment of the Hungarian Shakespeare Society.

The identity of the Hungarian Shakespeare
Society was fashioned with an eye on the previous ones, as there had already
been three. The first HSS came into being in 1860 as a project committee
overseeing the translation of Shakespeare’s works into Hungarian. This
committee worked within the Kisfaludy Society, and the head of the committee was
János Arany, poet and Shakespeare translator.
When the committee ran out of money, it slowly dissolved. The next Hungarian
Shakespeare Society came into being at the beginning of the 20th
century to help the study of Shakespeare, e.g. a Shakespeare Library section was
founded in the University Library at Budapest. After decades of silence HSS no.
3 was founded by Tibor Fabiny and late István Géher. The objective then was the
inclusion of the theatre and fostering foreign cooperation. The years of political
changes in the 1990’s, however, brought an end to this Hungarian Shakespeare Society.

The new, i.e. no. 4 Hungarian Shakespeare Society
learned from the previous ones and took four steps forward. The present HSS
keeps the objectives of its predecessors insofar as it fosters research, communication
among scholars, theatre people and translators. In contrast, however, with the
previous ones the present Hungarian Shakespeare Society has opened its gates to
another stakeholder in the Hungarian Shakespeare reception, namely secondary
schools. Also we have tried to balance Budapest centeredness, and have made use
of digital technology, such as mailing lists, a website and a Facebook page were created. We organize public lectures twice
a term, the first was by Prof. György Endre Szőnyi about filmic versions of Henry V, the second is due on 10 May and
József Gedeon will talk about the history of Gyula Shakespeare Festival that he
organizes with great success. We have also announced a blog post writing
competition. Furthermore we have plans about books to be written and creating a
database for the Hungarian translations of Shakespeare’s plays to help theatre
people and translators.

So, Will Shakespeare, on behalf of the new
Hungarian Shakespeare Society let me wish you a happy birthday! And if your
followers come to Hungary, tell them that the Hungarian Shakespeare Society
will be happy to provide the opportunity for them to give a talk to your
Hungarian followers.

Sunday, 17 February 2013

In what sense can one talk about the
materiality of a digital edition? This question sounds rather odd, as a digital
edition, a digital text does not have, is not constituted by matter in the
straightforward and simple manner. A digital text is processed through
electronic, digital signs, i.e. signs that can hardly have tangible physical
qualities. And if they had, to what extant would they be relevant for the
reading of a text? In this sense, thus, the question addressing the materiality
of the digital text sounds erroneous. Hopefully, there is more to this question,
however, than mere refusal.

In a more pragmatic context the question may
well make sense. Materiality can be conceptualized not only as an ontological category
but rather as a category that is deployed for the sake of exploring layers of
meaning constituted by the container and carrier of the linguistic aspect of a
text or an edition. This seems to be a viable solution, as when the materiality
of a printed text is referred to in the context of literary studies most of the
time it is used in a pragmatic manner. Materiality in this pragmatic context
denotes the sum of those qualities of a book that influence the reading process
and thus the construction of meaning beyond the linguistic aspect of a work.
Without believing that the forthcoming list may be comprehensive, these
qualities include the size of the book, the binding, the quality and size of
the paper, the letter size and typeset, the width of the margins, decoration,
marginalia. This pragmatic concept of materiality, i.e. an exploration of a
list of qualities and features that influence the reading process can be applied
directly and indirectly to a digital edition as well.

In the case of a digital edition there is
clearly a visual aspect that influences the reading process in a more flexible
way than in the case of a printed book. In a digital edition the text is made
up of letters that have visual qualities that can be anchored in size and type,
these letters fill the “page” so even here one may meditate about space between
the letters, lines, about the width of margins. Nevertheless, in some cases,
depending on the encoding of the edition and on the file format these qualities
can be changed by the customer, or reader: the type, the size can be open to
modification, one can zoom in or out in certain cases, one can read the text on
the screen of a laptop, a tablet pc or on a smartphone qualifying the physical,
visual aspect of the edition. All these are there for the sake of influencing
the reading process, as much as in the case of a printed book, although in a
different manner. But what seems relevant is that it is only the manner that
has changed and not the extralinguistic means: they are present but in a
different way.

Another aspect that influences the reading
process is the way the digital edition can be “read.”A digital edition can be
read as a book, i.e. in a linear manner. Also a digital edition can be read in
two nonlinear ways. First, as a hypertext through clicking in diverse
directions enriching the reading experience in a way that the sequence of the
parts of the reading material is created during the act of reading itself.
Second, digital reading involves machine reading, that is making sense through
queries, exploring algorithmic patterns and a variety of visualizing
techniques. Furthermore, it is also relevant in the case of a digital edition
what kind of colours, shapes and frames surround the text itself, what kind of
note-taking techniques can be applied, how one may share these findings, notes,
observations if it is a web-based edition. All these possibilities,
opportunities, tools and methods influence the act of making sense of a digital
edition beyond the strictly speaking linguistic aspect of a digital text. And
thus all these contribute to the process of the construction of meaning, the
signifying process of a say literary work.

A further aspect of the change from print to
digital that contributes to the understanding of digital materiality concerns
the shift from the fixed to what Hayes terms as procedural. A printed text
through its materiality is present for anybody almost objectively. This
material fixity is constituted by the technology of printing: if a work is
published the result is there for a long time, and in a way that was constructed
by the publisher, printer. Along with this every modification to the book—pages
torn out, damaged, written on it—will be seen as either contribution to the
signifying process or as corruption. In the case of a digital edition, however,
what matters is the ever-changing quality of the visual appearance of the
work. What lies behind what is perceived
is a series--complicated though—of digits. This series then is translated with
certain software into different signs that are interpreted by further
programmes; the results are further made readable for other programmes until
the desired effect is reached. Because of the great number of translations, and
the number of programmes that make these translations there is a heightened
effect of fluidity in the case of these digital editions.

This fluidity is further complicated by the
fact that the process of translations takes place not only once and for all but
every time the digital edition is opened. To account for the fluid aspect of a
digital edition it is also to be added that the hardware that underlies these
procedures also influences the reading process, insofar as the speed and
resolution of the visual effect are concerned. In this respect what counts are
the quality of the processor, of the hard drive, the graphic card, maybe the
internet connection and the quality of the monitor. All these result in such a
diversity of the possibilities of difference that instead of the discourse of
fixity and corruption it is only the procedural quality that one can meditate
about. This lack of fixity is part of the material aspect of a digital edition.

Thus, it seems to me that exploring the
materiality of a particular digital text is not entirely futile. In this
respect it is not the traditional physical quality that is at stake but rather whatever
there is from coding to hardware that influences the reading process besides
the linguistic aspect of a text.